China’s Life Satisfaction 1990-2010

Richard Easterlin is discussing his work on happiness in China at the University of Southern California.

Paper co-authors:
Richard A. Easterlin
Robson Morgan
Malgorzata Switek
Fei Wang

Corresponding Author:
Richard Easterlin
3620 S Vermont Ave, KAP 300
Los Angeles, CA, 90089

Abstract:
Despite its unprecedented growth of output per capita, China in the last two decades has essentially followed the life satisfaction trajectory of the central and eastern European transition countries – a U-shaped swing and a nil or declining trend.  There is no evidence of an increase in life satisfaction of the magnitude that might have been expected to result from the four-fold improvement in the level of per capita consumption that has taken place.  As in the case of the European countries the trend and U-shaped pattern appear to be due to a pronounced rise in unemployment followed by a mild decline, and an accompanying dissolution of the social safety net along with growing income inequality.  The burden of worsening life satisfaction in China has fallen chiefly on the lowest socio-economic groups.  An initially highly egalitarian distribution of life satisfaction has been replaced by an increasingly unequal one, with the life satisfaction of the lowest third of the income distribution decreasing absolutely while that of the upper third increases.